Unless otherwise indicated herein, approaches described in this section are not prior art to the claims listed below and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
Contactless dimensional measurements of articles are essential when there is a demand for fast and inexpensive estimations of the geometrical dimensions, provided that access to the measured articles is limited or the articles are in motion. For these situations different types of optical systems are typically used. These systems are usually based on the measurement of the projections of the measured articles formed by the optical system with known characteristics. With known or measured distance from the elements of the optical system to the measured articles the geometrical dimensions of the projections are recalculated to the dimensions of the articles. When the distance to the measured articles is not known, however, its contactless estimation would require special equipment, namely different types of range finders including optical ones.
Many everyday applications require fast yet accurate contactless dimensional measurements including, for example, measurements of the parts of a body for placing orders with online clothes retailers or for slimming process assessment. The usage of the range finders or other special equipment in such applications is highly undesirable.